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Parents' perspectives on centralized cleft services for children: the development of a DCE questionnaire
Author(s) -
Ke KM,
Mackichan F,
Sandy JR,
Ness AR,
Hollingworth W
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
oral diseases
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.953
H-Index - 87
eISSN - 1601-0825
pISSN - 1354-523X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1601-0825.2012.01969.x
Subject(s) - qualitative research , service (business) , psychology , qualitative property , health care , nursing , medicine , computer science , business , marketing , social science , machine learning , sociology , economics , economic growth
Objective Incorporating user's perspectives in healthcare delivery is important. Simple questionnaires may not capture these as well as a discrete choice experiment ( DCE ) which enables the exploration of users' trade‐offs between different service attributes. Qualitative methods are increasingly used to improve a DCE 's face validity, but few studies adequately describe them. This paper describes the qualitative investigations in the development of a DCE questionnaire to elicit parents' perspectives on centralized services for children with cleft lip and palate. Methods Semi‐structured telephone interviews were conducted with 16 parents from across the UK , except Wales. Data analysis was carried out by the constant comparative method. Results Five attributes and their levels were inductively identified: usefulness and amount of information (four levels); staff attitude at cleft centres (two levels); continuity of care (two levels); personal costs of attending appointments (four levels); and cleft centres facilities (two levels). An unexpected finding was that parents' sense of responsibility towards their child made a ‘willingness‐to‐travel’ attribute unacceptable to them, but they were receptive to a ‘willingness‐to‐pay’ attribute. Conclusion Using qualitative methods with service users in attribute development for a DCE helps to uncover issues that may not be apparent to researchers or health service staff.